The light-front holographic mapping of classical gravity in AdS space, modified by a positive-sign dilaton background, leads to a nonperturbative effective coupling $α_s^{AdS}(Q^2)$. It agrees with hadron physics data extracted from different observables, such as the effective charge defined by the Bjorken sum rule, as well as with the predictions of models with built-in confinement and lattice simulations. It also displays a transition from perturbative to nonperturbative conformal regimes at a momentum scale $ \sim 1$ GeV. The resulting $β$ function appears to capture the essential characteristics of the full $β$ function of QCD, thus giving further support to the application of the gauge/gravity duality to the confining dynamics of strongly coupled QCD. Commensurate scale relations relate observables to each other without scheme or scale ambiguity. In this paper we extrapolate these relations to the nonperturbative domain, thus extending the range of predictions based on $α_s^{AdS}(Q^2)$.
Light-front holography offers a successful first semiclassical approximation to hadronic spectroscopy and dynamics. We review its underlying assumptions, its remarkable predictions as well as attempts to go beyond the semiclassical approximation in order to the describe a wide range of data with a universal AdS/QCD mass scale.
I survey recent developments in hadron physics which follow from the application of superconformal quantum mechanics and light-front holography. This includes new insights into the physics of color confinement, chiral symmetry, the spectroscopy and dynamics of hadrons, as well as surprising supersymmetric relations between the masses of mesons, baryons, and tetraquarks. I also will discuss some novel features of QCD -- such as color transparency, hidden color, and asymmetric intrinsic heavy-quark phenomena. The elimination of renormalization scale ambiguities and the modification of QCD sum ru…
We demonstrate that a nonzero strangeness contribution to the spacelike electromagnetic form factor of the nucleon is evidence for a strange-antistrange asymmetry in the nucleon's light-front wave function, thus implying different nonperturbative contributions to the strange and antistrange quark distribution functions. A recent lattice QCD calculation of the nucleon strange quark form factor predicts that the strange quark distribution is more centralized in coordinate space than the antistrange quark distribution, and thus the strange quark distribution is more spread out in light-front mome…
Light-Front Quantization -- Dirac's "Front Form" -- provides a physical, frame-independent formalism for hadron dynamics and structure. Observables such as structure functions, transverse momentum distributions, and distribution amplitudes are defined from the hadronic LFWFs. One obtains new insights into the hadronic mass scale, the hadronic spectrum, and the functional form of the QCD running coupling in the nonperturbative domain using light-front holography. In addition, superconformal algebra leads to remarkable supersymmetric relations between mesons and baryons. I also discuss evidence …
The mass renormalization of nonperturbative light-front Hamiltonian theory: An illustration using truncated, Pauli-Villars-regulated Yukawa interactions
We present an analytically solvable 3D light-front Hamiltonian model for hadrons that extends light-front holography by including finite mass quarks and a longitudinal confinement term. We propose that the model is suitable as an improved analytic approximation to QCD at a low resolution scale. We demonstrate that it preserves desired Lorentz symmetries and it produces improved agreement with the experimental mass spectroscopy and other properties of the light mesons. Importantly, the model also respects chiral symmetry and the Gell-Mann-Oakes-Renner relation.
A general procedure for obtaining frame-independent, three-dimensional light-front coordinate-space wave functions is introduced. The third spatial coordinate, $\tilde z$ , is the frame independent coordinate conjugate to the light-front momentum coordinate $x={k^+\over P^+}$ which appears in the momentum-space light-front wave functions underlying generalized parton distributions, structure functions, distribution amplitudes, form factors, and other hadronic observables. These causal light-front coordinate-space wave functions are used to derive a general expression for the quark distribution…
We give an overview of recent progress into the infrared structure of QCD based on the gauge/gravity correspondence and light-front quantization, where the color confining interaction for mesons and baryons is determined by an underlying superconformal algebraic structure. This new approach to hadron physics gives remarkable connections and predictions across the entire mass spectrum of hadrons and also describes the infrared behavior of the strong coupling. More recently, an extensive study of form factors, polarized and unpolarized parton distributions and the sea quark contribution to the n…
We evaluate the cross section for the pion induced Drell-Yan process in two different models of the pion light-front wave function, inspired by light-front holographic approaches. We obtain the valence quark distribution functions in those models, which after QCD evolution, are consistent with the experimental data from the E-0615 experiment at Fermilab. Supplemented by the parton distribution functions of the target nuclei, we obtain the cross section consistent with the experimental data for the $π^-$ Nucleus $\rightarrow {μ^+μ^-X}$ Drell-Yan process.
I review applications of superconformal algebra. light-front holography, and an extended form of conformal symmetry to hadron spectroscopy and dynamics. QCD is not supersymmetrical in the traditional sense -- the QCD Lagrangian is based on quark and gluonic fields -- not squarks nor gluinos. However, its hadronic eigensolutions conform to a representation of superconformal algebra. and provide a unified Regge spectroscopy of meson, baryon, and tetraquarks with a universal Regge slope. The pion $q \bar q$ eigenstate is composite but yet has zero mass for $m_q=0.$ Light-Front Holography also pre…
We examine the current state-of-the-art in nonperturbative calculations done with Hamiltonians constructed in light-front quantization of various field theories. The language of light-front quantization is introduced, and important (numerical) techniques, such as Pauli--Villars regularization, discrete light-cone quantization, basis light-front quantization, the light-front coupled-cluster method, the renormalization group procedure for effective particles, sector-dependent renormalization, and the Lanczos diagonalization method, are surveyed. Specific applications are discussed for quenched s…
We compute an effective potential between two fixed sources in light-front quantization of a quenched scalar Yukawa theory that models the interaction of complex scalar fields through the exchange of a neutral scalar. Despite the breaking of explicit rotational symmetry by the use of light-front coordinates, the effective potential is rotationally symmetric and matches the standard Yukawa potential for scalar exchange. The neutral scalar field is represented by a coherent state, which is obtained nonperturbatively as an eigenstate of our model Hamiltonian, with the eigenenergy determining the …
We use AdS/QCD holographic Distributions Amplitudes for the vector mesons $ρ$ and $K^*$ in order to predict the radiative decays $B \to ργ$ and $B \to K^* γ$ as well as the semileptonic decays $B \to ρl ν$ and $B \to K^* μ^+ μ^-$. For the radiative decays, we find that the AdS/QCD DAs offer the advantage of avoiding end-point singularities when computing power suppressed contributions. For the semileptonic decays $B \to ρl ν$ and $B \to K^* μ^+ μ^-$, we compare our predictions to the latest BaBar and LHCb data respectively.
We present analytic parametrizations for the $γ^\ast N \to N(1440)$ form factors derived from light-front holography in leading twist approximation. The new parametrizations describe the electromagnetic form factors using analytic functions dependent on the masses of the $ρ$ meson and respective radial excitations, as well as the masses of the nucleon and the resonance $N(1440)$. The free parameters of the model, associated with three independent couplings, are interpreted as bare couplings, and are fixed by the nucleon data for large $Q^2$. The proposed parametrizations compare remarkably wel…
QCD is well understood at short distances where perturbative calculations are feasible. Establishing an explicit analytic connection between the short-distance regime and the large-distance physics of quark confinement has been a long-sought goal. A major challenge is to relate the scale $Λ_{s}$ underlying the evolution of the QCD coupling in the perturbative regime to the masses of hadrons. We show here how new theoretical insights into the behavior of QCD at large distances leads to such a relation. The resulting prediction for $Λ_{s}$ in the $\overline{MS}$ scheme agrees well with experimen…
We calculate the mass spectrum and the structure of the positronium system at a strong coupling in a basis light-front approach. We start from the light-front QED Hamiltonian and retain one dynamical photon in our basis. We perform the fermion mass renormalization associated with the nonperturbative fermion self-energy correction. We present the resulting mass spectrum and wave functions for the selected low-lying states. Next, we apply this approach to QCD and calculate the heavy meson system with one dynamical gluon retained. We illustrate the obtained mass spectrum and wave functions for th…
Superconformal algebra leads to remarkable connections between the masses of mesons and baryons of the same parity -- supersymmetric relations between the bosonic and fermionic bound states of QCD. Supercharges connect the mesonic eigenstates to their baryonic superpartners, where the mesons have internal angular momentum one unit higher than the baryons. We also predict the existence of tetraquarks which are degenerate in mass with baryons with the same angular momentum. An effective supersymmetric light-front Hamiltonian for hadrons composed of light quarks can be constructed by embedding su…
Through the development of a parallel code called TMSWIFT, an extensive light-front quantization study of the nonperturbative spectrum of the bound state $(μ^+μ^-)$, true muonium, has been performed. Using Padé approximants, it has been possible to extract continuum and infinite-cutoff limits for the singlet and triplet states for a range of values of the coupling constant $α$. This data set allows for an investigation of the $α$ dependence of the light-front spectra, the results of which are compared to standard calculations. Decay constants have also been obtained. Improved calculations have…
The QCD light-front Hamitonian equation derived from quantization at fixed LF time provides a causal, frame-independent, method for computing hadron spectroscopy and dynamical observables. de Alfaro, Fubini, and Furlan (dAFF) have made an important observation that a mass scale can appear in the equations of motion without affecting the conformal invariance of the action if one adds a term to the Hamiltonian proportional to the dilatation operator or the special conformal operator. If one applies the dAFF procedure to the QCD light-front Hamiltonian, it leads to a color confining potential $κ^…
Light-Front Quantization provides a physical, frame-independent formalism for hadron dynamics and structure. Observables such as structure functions, transverse momentum distributions, and distribution amplitudes are defined from the hadronic light-front wavefunctions. One obtains new insights into the hadronic spectrum, light-front wavefunctions, and the functional form of the QCD running coupling in the nonperturbative domain using light-front holography -- the duality between the front form and AdS$_5$, the space of isometries of the conformal group. In addition, superconformal algebra lead…
